Sleeping peacefully atop the bed was a face that Baixue could not be any more familiar with. It was the face of the person who had saved her from her darkest times, cared for her in the place of her family, and raised her as one of her own.
It was the face of her Master and Adopted Mother, Chu Mingxi.
"T-this. Impossible!" She staggered back, surprised and horrified. The young scholar's face wasn't an exact copy of Grand Elder Chu; however, there were at least seven parts of likeness in his features!
Moreover, he possessed the same indigo-coloured hair as her master! And as far as Baixue knew, no other family possessed that hair colour except her master!!
"No, no! This can't be!!" she vehemently denied. Could Wuzhi be related to her master? No, that couldn't be. She had once heard her master tell her that she possessed no family in this world. But then, how could this be!?
Baixue felt her head spin as a wave of complicated thoughts overcame her. She hurriedly rubbed her forehead and forced herself to calm down. "Don't overthink and be methodical."
A few minutes later, she lowered her hand and opened her eyes to gaze at the unconscious scholar with a complicated gaze. Now that she thought about it, she realized that she did not know much about Wuzhi.
Hell, before this moment, she hadn't realized that she had never actually seen Wuzhi's face!
"A Path Technique?" She ventured a guess. "But what sort of Path Technique could be so mystical?" She had 'seen' Wuzhi and had spent days alongside him. And with that said, she had never felt for a single moment a sense of incongruity or doubt about his appearance.
In her eyes, Wuzhi had always appeared fine. His appearance was… Baixue realized that she could not continue this line of thought. Oddly enough, she could scarcely recall how the young scholar looked. Every time she forced herself to recall the memory, it grew more and more elusive and faint.
Baixue fixed her eyes on Wuzhi's sleeping face once more. The instant she laid eyes on him, the picture in her mind refreshed. However, when she looked away and grew distracted for a few minutes, she realized that the 'picture' was quickly growing faint.
It was a truly divine technique.
"Could it be the [Information Path]?" she asked herself. Much like Wuzhi, Baixue also had the habit of thinking out loud. "No, it's not just the [Information Path]. There are also hints of [Wisdom Path], [Deception Path], [Transformation Path], [Scrying Path], and other paths." There were also certain paths that the female heroine could not quite identify.
Wuzhi's concealment technique was near-invincible under the Sovereign Realm and left little to no traces. Even the Heaven Scheming Devil, a person most notable for his information-gathering techniques, could not discover Wuzhi without resorting to some special means.
Baixue was strong; being at the top of Rank 4 and mere inches away from entering Rank 5. However, in the face of the young scholar's concealment technique, she was too green and naïve to think that she could crack it.
After trying a few times, she realized that no matter what she did, the 'picture' of Wuzhi's face refused to stick in her mind. The moment she looked away or was distracted by some other thought, it rapidly faded into the background. Thus, the female heroine quickly gave up and moved on to other subjects.
As she sat thinking, Baixue realized that apart from Wuzhi's face and features, she did not forget any detail that was disclosed by the young scholar. She remembered the stories that he had shared, the experiences that he had recounted, and the bits of advice that he had given. Her earlier guess that his technique was related to the [Information Path] was quickly proved wrong, as [Information Path Techniques] usually blanketed information that had to be hidden and wasn't very malleable and subtle.
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After spending nearly an hour in thought, Baixue soon concluded. "All this thinking is getting me nowhere. It would be better to simply ask him for the truth." She wasn't a practitioner of the [Wisdom Path] and found it incredibly difficult to connect the various dots. Concurring with her heart, she decided to be straightforward and ask Wuzhi for the truth.
She wanted to know the truth. She needed it.
Shaking her head, Baixue returned to the bathroom to complete her bath and wash off the blood that had gotten on her body.
---
It was nighttime when Wuzhi regained consciousness. He sat up with a startle and instinctively touched the top of his head; the bamboo hat was missing.
"Are you looking for this?" asked a voice, coldly.
Sporting a bitter smile on his face, Wuzhi apologetically began. "Sister Baixue, I—!" He was immediately interrupted.
"I want the truth, Wuzhi. No partials or half-truths, but the whole truth." She weighed a severe gaze on him and asked, "What exactly happened? And who exactly are you?"
Hearing her questions, Wuzhi considered the situation for a moment before relaxing his body. He shrugged his shoulders and answered, "Sister Baixue is just in asking those questions. I am bound to answer you."
"To answer your first question; it was me who stabbed myself with the pen. Some time ago, I was forced to use a dangerous Path Technique to save myself from a near-death encounter. Said, Path Technique has a dangerous side-effect wherein it greatly wounds my psyche. This sometimes causes me to lose my 'grip' over reality and makes me wildly impulsive; case in point, the stabbing." Wuzhi spoke the truth.
The Unnamed Path that he had created was far from being completed. He possessed a few experimental yet powerful techniques that drew from this Path. However, each of these techniques was untested, wildly unstable, and rife with dangerous side effects.
Getting kidnapped by the Iron Rhino Tribe had not been in his cards. Annihilating all of them had been a necessity. Having no other choice, Wuzhi had been forced to use one of his dangerous techniques to tide over the disaster. In the end, he won. However, the cost that he had incurred for the victory was too steep.
Wuzhi was not a traditional cultivator. He did not follow the established system but instead followed one of his very own make.
In the traditional cultivation system, a practitioner and their Core were the two central components.
In Wuzhi's cultivation system, however, a practitioner and their psyche were the two main components.
In other words, Wuzhi reckless massacre of the Iron Rhino Tribe had dealt fatal damage to his unique cultivation. And for the very reason of it being unique, a one of its kind, the actual extent and future of this damage was still unknown.
He did not lie when he answered Baixue. As the creator and the one who had been injured, he knew better than anyone else the extent of his injuries. This incident, where he had nearly given in to his primal emotions and had to use excruciating pain to save himself was merely a minor hiccup in what was to come.
The damage to his psyche had to be repaired. Otherwise, death would be a simpler, less painful outcome!
Baixue took a moment to digest this information. After a few minutes, she cautiously asked, "So, not only do I have to protect you from outside threats but also from 'internal' ones?"
"I will take care not to worry you with my issues. Sister Baixue can relax and only protect me from the outside threats," Wuzhi encouragingly replied.
"Like hell, I can relax!" Baixue yelled. She then sighed and rubbed her forehead. "I think I'm starting to regret taking on this employment."
"Aw, don't say that, Sister Baixue. I shall promise to you now; taking on this mission will be the best decision that you've ever made!" He confidently boasted.
"I will see about that in the future," Baixue dismissively said. She then straightened up once more and seriously asked. "Don't think I've forgotten about my second question. Speak; who exactly are you? Why do my Path Techniques not work on you?"
In truth, compared to her previous question, this was the question that made her burn with anxiety. What was Wuzhi's identity? Why did he look so similar to her master/adopted mother?
Realizing that his attempts to circumvent this question had failed, Wuzhi resignedly sighed and answered. "Alright, I'll tell you the truth. I'm an heir of the Mu Household; the bastard son of Sovereign Mu Wudi."
His soft proclamation sounded like a thunderclap in her ears. Baixue sat with her eyes widened; pupils expanded, and mouth agape. Her breath had gotten caught in her throat and her heart had skipped a beat. She could hardly believe the words that she had just heard.
Wuzhi was the bastard son of World Sovereign Mu Wudi? He was an heir to the Mu Household? But then…
…why did he look so similar to Chu Mingxi; possessing the same hair and similar features?
Baixue's very body trembled with disbelief. A startling answer revealed itself within her mind. But before that answer could fully appear in the fore of her mind, a question remained; had her master/adopted mother been 'claimed' by Mu Wudi?
However, wasn't he the person that she loathed with all her heart?